The Battle for Allegra: Underground

Season Two: Espisode Nineteen

Caleb Fast

Copyright © 2022 Caleb Fast

www.calebfast.com
First Published in 2022 by the Author on Amazon
All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the author.
For information regarding permission, please email the author at calebfast@calebfast.com Please direct all further inquiries to the author at calebfast@calebfast.com

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and events are the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real-world people, events, or locations are entirely coincidental.

Contents

Title Page

Copyright

One

Two

Three

DESPERATE PLEA!

The Story Continues,

Other Books By Caleb Fast:

One

The Bulwark, Allegra

“And we’re back,” Louise says with a tired, content sigh. Looking around, she adds, “It feels good to be home.”

Smiling, Matthew can’t help but agree. It did feel good to be back in the Bulwark and back in Sanctuary after all this time. With everything that had just happened over the past dozen or so hours, it felt even better to be back in a familiar place surrounded exclusively by familiar people.

“Well, we rested up on our way over here, so now what?” Louise asks once she takes a seat on a nearby bench.

Matthew shrugs, still feeling a little dazed after everything. Between Dixie dying, Marie and him finally hitting it off, and all the other things that had happened, Matthew isn’t quite sure what to think. The idea of planning ahead seemed entirely impossible right now.

“We could patrol the Bulwark a bit,” Marie offers, “Make ourselves known, show everyone else out there that we don’t think we’re above grunt work like that.”

“Well, I guess there’s probably nothing better to do…” Louise trails off.

“Well, I think Louise and I need to get our little construction robot all fixed up,” Alois volunteers, “So, why don’t the rest of you figure something else out?”

“Sounds like a plan,” Marie nods.

Matthew idly watches as the twins leave and he can hear the sound of them working in the hangar area just a few beats later. Despite their willingness and ability to get right back to work, Matthew still isn’t feeling too keen on the idea of busy work. Something about just finding something to do for the sake of doing something felt meaningless to him. He had the urge to do something great in honor of Dixie but had no idea just what to do.

“I supposed I may as well assist in training up the new recruits,” Rav’ian says, breaking the silence, “That is, I will do so if you do not require my aid, Matthew.”

Waving his hand slightly, Matthew gives his permission to Rav’ian before falling silent once more.

Several minutes of absolute silence pass before Marie speaks up, “You know, we could go on a walk, or something, Matthew.”

Nodding, Matthew gives into the suggestion. Sure, it was the grunt work of patrolling that he hadn’t wanted to do, but there wasn’t anything better to do. Additionally, he had to figure out where Jane was—he hadn’t seen her for quite some time now.

•••••••••••••••

“So?” Marie prompts.

Looking over at Marie, Matthew asks, “What?”

“So, what are you thinking?”

“Nothing.”

“I’m sure that’s not the case,”

Matthew chuckles, “No, it is. I just… I don’t have anything to think about.”

“Not even me?” Marie asks as she flips her hair and offers Matthew a flirtatious look.

Matthew laughs softly at that, but his mood returns to its previous sober calmness after a beat.

“I’m sorry,” Marie sighs, “I can’t imagine what you’re feeling right now.”

Matthew nods slowly, his mind lazily taking stock of the mess of muted emotions that he is feeling. The sharpness of each emotion had lessened with every passing hour since he heard the news about Dixie. Now they seem to be loitering about in the background, waiting for something.

What those emotions were waiting for, Matthew didn’t know. He didn’t care either, but he felt a muted sense of curiosity about everything going on in his head.

“I’d expect your dad’s probably home from his fishing trip,” Marie says, “Maybe you could talk to him?”

“Maybe,” Matthew shrugs, not entirely sold on the idea.

“Well, you can’t just keep doing all of this,” Marie shakes her head, “Not forever.”

Matthew simply shrugs in response.

Marie waits a few more beats before she continues, “You know, maybe we need to find something to help you cope? I know of a lot of people who were helped by stuff like that.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“I don’t know, what did you and Dixie do together?”

“I don’t know… everything, really.”

“Well, what if we—” Marie doesn’t get to finish.

“Mudskipper!” an alien Mudder says excitedly as they skid to a stop in front of Matthew. They offer a quick salute before they excitedly continue, each sentence smashed against the next, “You’re just the guy I was looking for! There’s been a—we found a bunker. It’s some sort of tunnel—it’s full of… it’s full of gassers! I think they’re angry too! One of them almost killed Gorgesh and Toih!”

“What’s your name, soldier?” Matthew asks as he eyes the alien Mudder. The Mudder is clearly male, and, if Matthew’s memory serves him, the alien is a Frazian.

“It’s Nock, sir,” the Frazian answers with a flamboyant nod, “Now, follow me! We need your help down there!”

“Lead the way,” Matthew nods back.

Matthew follows the large Frazian, Nock through several trenches, and, as he follows, he can’t help but notice that the Frazian seems a lot more youthful than the other Frazians that Matthew had met on the front. While it was very hard for Matthew to guess the ages of aliens, he couldn’t help but wonder if Nock is just an adolescent or perhaps a young adult.

“They’re in there,” Nock announces as he stops outside of a large crater, “We were poking around when we found this tunnel system… I think you’d be very interested in it, once we clear it out.”

Matthew looks into the crater and sees that there is a hole near the base of it that leads into some dark area beyond. If it weren’t for what Nock had told him, he would have overlooked the small hole and opted to forget about it, but the Frazian’s story had him curious.

“Think we should check it out, Marie?” Matthew asks excitedly. A second passes before he realizes that his somber mood had lifted, and he can’t help but appreciate that fact. Perhaps the best coping mechanism he had here on the front was simply fulfilling his duties.

“Sounds risky,” Marie breathes. Looking over at Nock, she asks, “And where are your friends now?”

“I don’t know for sure,” Nock answers, “We all split up to find help with the gassers that are deeper in there.”

“Did any of the gassers get out?” Matthew asks nervously. He didn’t like the idea of having to clear the Bulwark of gassers once more. The last time had given him more than enough scares and there was enough gore to give him nightmares for the rest of his life.

“No, Mudskipper,” Nock shakes his large, burnt orange Frazian head, “That hole leads into some kind of storage room, we shut the door when we saw the gassers—I am using all those words correctly, right sir?”

“You are,” Matthew nods slowly. A few beats pass before Matthew repeats his question to Marie, “Think we should go?”

“You really want to, don’t you?” Marie asks Matthew with a chuckle.

Shrugging, Matthew answers, “Well, I can’t just leave the gassers down there.”

Sighing, Marie gives in, “Fine, we can go, but I need to capture a couple of gassers for the research that Johnson and the rest of the Coalition want me to do.”

“You want to—you want to capture them!?” Nock stammers, shocked.

“I’ve got a job to do,” Marie sighs and shrugs, “I don’t want to do it, but I have to.”

“What about your Dawn guards?” Matthew asks as he carefully scans their surroundings, “I haven’t seen any of them.”

“I’m sure they’re around,” Marie shrugs, “But, come to think of it, let’s get in there before they go and tell me I can’t go. I’m getting tired of them already.”

Chucking, Matthew points out, “Shouldn’t you try and get used to them if you’ll be stuck with them from now on?”

Rolling her eyes, Marie counters, “No, I should be enjoying what little freedom I can while I still have it. Come on, let’s go.”

At that, Marie starts working her way down into the crater, skidding and getting dirty her whole way down.

“Nock, guard the entrance,” Matthew orders as he slips his Beet carapace helmet back on. Fixing his old rifle on his back, he follows Marie.

No matter who the upper brass of the Coalition thought he was, Matthew knew that he’d still be the kind of guy who would go into any bad situation without much of any hesitation. As he saw it, a higher rank only ensured that he felt even more obligated to lead by example.

Two

The Bulwark, Allegra

“A creepy, dark room that’s underground and totally forgotten, nice,” Matthew grimaces as he summarizes his surroundings.

No more than a dozen boxes surround Matthew and Marie in an otherwise completely vacant room. The room itself is rather large, perhaps six meters by six meters, which surprises Matthew. Besides the light coming through the crumbling section of the wall and ceiling that had allowed Matthew and Marie into the room, nothing else is lending any light to Matthew’s straining eyes.

“Looks like there’s only one door, that’s nice,” Marie points out.

“Except we know for a fact that there are gassers behind it,” Matthew quickly adds. Sighing, he looks back out of the hole he had entered through, and he gets Nock’s attention, “Nock, don’t let any gassers out of here.”

“You’ve already told me to stand guard,” Nock complains.

“Well, I mean it,” Matthew shrugs, “I hate gassers. Those things are terrifying.”

Not waiting for a response, Matthew turns from the hole and walks over to the nearest box. Admittedly, he was very curious about what someone would leave behind down here. What made him even more curious was the thought of what this area once was and, particularly, how gassers managed to get down here. That final bit gets Matthew thinking and, when he can’t come up with anything, he looks over at Marie.

“What?” Marie asks before Matthew can ask his question, “Is something wrong?”

“I’m just thinking about how it’s weird how the gassers got down here.”

“Use your head, Matthew,” Marie says. She lets a few seconds pass before she points at the ground and continues, “See all those tracks? The gassers came in the same way we did.”

“So…” Matthew trails off as he follows the muddied tracks to the doorway. Frowning, he finally finishes, “So, that means that these tunnels have probably been abandoned for a while then, right?”

“Well, if there are gassers, then I’d guess that means that no one has used these tunnels for at least a few Allegrian days—otherwise they would have cleared the gassers out.”

“Either that or the gassers got whoever was trying to use the tunnels…”

“That’s a possibility,” Marie shrugs, “But let’s not dwell on that, we’ve got a job to do, remember?”

“Right,” Matthew says sheepishly, “Let’s get your gassers and take out the rest of them.”

Still thinking about the boxes, Matthew opens the one nearest him and is greeted by the sight of a lot of dried meats. If these are still good, they could be useful, Matthew thinks as a slight smile crosses his face. He is about to dig deeper and explore another box, but his stomach gets the best of him. Opening a packet of the meat, he inhales the salty aroma and tentatively tastes one of the pieces.

“What’s that?” Marie asks as she draws near. Stopping, she approvingly says, “Jerky, nice.”

Working on his first mouthful of the stuff, Matthew nods, “And it’s really good stuff too.”

“Looks homemade, wonder where it’s from,” Marie muses as she takes out and examines a bag of her own.

Shoving another handful of beef into his mouth, Matthew sets the packet down and checks out the next box, which is also full of homemade jerky. The next box is full of jars of fruit preserves, also apparently from someone’s home.

“A big stash of food, interesting,” Marie nods, “Wonder who all of this was for.”

Looking through yet another box of preserved food, Matthew offers, “Well, aren’t the Allegrians all preppers? Maybe this is all someone’s stash.”

“Maybe,” Marie nods, “Either that, or this is some sort of smuggler tunnel for all their prepper stuff.”

“Sounds like a great find either way,” Matthew announces happily, “Because that means we’ve got even more going for us. Imagine how much of a help these tunnels can be alone, forget what’s already down here! We’ll be able to go all over if they lead anywhere important.”

Marie doesn’t say anything in response to that, and Matthew’s attention is still on the boxes. After opening the last one, which is also full of food, he finally looks over at the doorway.

“You ready?” Marie asks.

Nodding, Matthew grabs his rifle and trains it on the doorway, “I guess so.”

“Let’s try and catch the gassers without hurting them,” Marie says as she points at the gun, “No shooting.”

“Then how are we supposed to deal with them?”

“We’ll just let one in at a time until we’ve caught enough of them.”

“And if they all try busting through the door?”

“Matthew, you and I both know what we’d do if that happened. Now come on, I need my test subjects. I don’t like the idea of this any more than you do.”

Relenting, Matthew swings his rifle back around and makes sure that he can still easily reach it from where it’s hanging on his back. Satisfied, he walks over to the door and stops. Pressing his ear against the cool metal, he listens for any signs of gassers on the other side.

Several seconds pass and all Matthew can hear is the gentle rasp of just one gasser.

I guess this is going to be a lot easier than I expected, Matthew thinks, a sense of relief washing over him. Looking over at Marie, he whispers, passing along his findings, and then adds, “I’ll open the door, you get the gasser, then I shut it. We’ve got to be quick.”

Marie nods.

Swinging the door inward, Matthew watches as Marie slips out. Not even a second later and Marie is dragging a gasser back into the room.

Once both Marie and the gasser are clear of the door, Matthew closes the door as quickly and quietly as he can.

The door now closed, Matthew pounces on the gasser, which is just now beginning to put up a fight.

“Tie it up, or something!” Matthew orders as he wrestles the gasser and does his best to pin it.

“I’m working on it!” Marie hisses as she fumbles around with a short line of paracord.

“Well—” Matthew jerks his hand away from the gasser’s mouth just in time to avoid losing a finger, “Work on it faster!”

After another thirty seconds of struggling, Matthew changes gears and he rolls so he is now sitting on top of the gasser. Reaching behind himself he grabs the gasser’s legs with one arm, simultaneously, he drives the gasser’s face directly into the concrete floor of the room and he keeps it there.

Thanks to the new position, Marie is able to finish tying up the gasser and, when she finishes, Matthew rolls off the hog-tied beast and he scoots to a safe distance.

Wheezing slightly from all the exertion, Matthew grunts, “We need a new plan.”

“Yeah,” Marie agrees, equally as winded as Matthew.

“Maybe a snare?”

“But how would we catch it and tie it down once it’s snared?”

“Well, what are you thinking?”

“I don’t know.”

“Think you could get along with just one gasser?”

Marie frowns and she looks at the immobilized gasser. Sighing, she says, “I guess.”

“Well, they won’t be of much use to you if we both get killed trying to catch the next one.”

“I know,” Marie snaps, “Let’s just get to clearing the rest of the tunnel.”

“We can try and catch other ones while we’re going,” Matthew offers, “I just don’t think we can keep doing this like we are.”

“I know,” Marie snaps once more, “Now let’s go.”

Knowing that pressing the matter would only get Marie mad, Matthew stands and helps her to her feet.

They were heading in deeper.

Stopping just shy of the door, Matthew shoulders his rifle once more and he waits a few seconds. If any gassers had been alerted to their presence, they would be making a lot of noise. Knowing enough to proceed with caution and lead with his ears, Matthew simply listens.

When there aren’t any signs or sounds of any gassers, Matthew glances back at Marie and he confirms that she has her own weapon at the ready. Satisfied that she is just as ready as him, Matthew silently opens the door once more.

Craning his neck into the hallway, Matthew looks both ways and quickly confirms that there is nothing to see.

Not that there weren’t any hostiles, there just wasn’t any light to see anything with.

Sighing, Matthew fishes out a flashlight and fixes it to his rifle. Peeking into the hall once more, he turns on the light and ensures that the coast is in fact clear.

Satisfied, Matthew nods at Marie and steps through the doorway, his weapon still raised.

“Looks like the tracks go off both ways,” Marie notes as she shines her light on the ground.

“Which means we’re surrounded if anything goes bad,” Matthew grunts, “We’ll get cut off from this door if we go too far too.”

“Well, that’s one way to look at it,” Marie chuckles softly, “As I see it, this just means we’ll only have to deal with half the gassers at once.”

“Unless if they all swarm us,” Matthew shudders. He hated the gassers, more than anything, he hated what the gassers were. To think that he was shooting at people who were once Mudders and had since been corrupted by whatever the Beets put in those gas canisters scared Matthew.

“I vote we head west,” Marie sounds, changing the subject, “I want to know where this pops out in or behind the Bulwark.

Nodding, Matthew can’t help but agree. He needed to know what the risk to the Bulwark was more than where the tunnel extended to in the eastwardly direction. That leg of exploration would have to wait for now. On top of that, it was likely a whole lot safer to check out things to the west anyway.

Shutting the door behind him and Marie, Matthew turns to his right and starts heading west, at Marie’s recommendation. They continue heading that way for a short while before Matthew says, “I’m assuming the Beets haven’t been down here just yet.”

“I think you’re right.”

“Probably for the best that they haven’t been down here, things could have ended very badly for us otherwise.”

“Yes,”

“Weird that we haven’t even heard anything from the other gassers though…”

“Maybe it was just that one,”

“But there were a lot of tracks back there—even here there are a lot of them.”

Marie, who is walking beside Matthew now, simply shrugs. She lets a moment pass before she offers, “Maybe that one that we caught did a whole lot of walking or something. It did seem a little tired.”

“Maybe,” Matthew also shrugs, “I don’t know though, seems weird.”

“Well, sometimes weird is what happens in real life,” Marie offers, “Either that or this tunnel is really, really long and the rest of the gassers are a ways ahead of us.”

“Which sounds more reasonable to me.”

“Sounds that way to me too.”

“Well, I guess we’ll figure things out either way…”

Matthew and Marie continue forging their way through the tunnel and they eventually come across a door after walking at least a kilometer. Besides a lone gasser, which Matthew and Marie quickly tied up, there isn’t anything else of note.

Eying up the door, Matthew can’t help but notice the similarities between it, and the one that they had entered the hallway through.

“Any guesses on what’s in here?” Matthew realizes that he had whispered only after he had finished talking. As he waits for Marie’s response, he presses his ear against this door and waits.

“Think it’s another storage room like the other one?” Marie asks.

Matthew gently knocks on the door and waits for any sort of response. When nothing seems out of the ordinary, he simply answers, “Let’s find out.”

Swinging the door wide open, Matthew quickly checks the corners and then behind the door. Sure enough, there aren’t any gassers in here.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a lot of anything else in the room either. All that Matthew can find are some piles of dirt and dust that look like they had been there for easily a decade.

“Weird how the other room seemed more used and this one seems completely abandoned,” Marie says, voicing Matthew’s own thoughts.

“I guess we should press on ahead, then,” Matthew sighs and shrugs.

As he and Marie leave the empty storage room, Matthew shuts the door, and they continue deeper into the hallway. Besides a few short conversations, a few jokes, and a whole lot of silence, not a lot happens. Another kilometer comes and goes, as does another storage room. This one, unlike the last, is filled to the brim with boxes.

After a few minutes of Matthew and Marie poking around in a few of the boxes, they come out empty-handed. There isn’t anything too exciting in this room so they leave and continue even further ahead. When they pass yet another room another kilometer away, Matthew stops.

“What is it?” Marie asks, “Why’d you stop?”

“I think this thing’s just going to keep going and going.”

“So?”

“So, don’t you think our time could be better spent elsewhere?”

“I’m enjoying myself; it’s been a while since we were as safe as we are down here. Plus, it’s been nice catching up and chatting.”

Matthew chuckles at Marie’s comment about being safer down here. He had thought the same thing and, ironically, he realized that he and Marie were anything but safe down here. Somewhere, hiding in the darkness, was an untold number of gassers, plus other things that Matthew couldn’t know and didn’t want to think about. Despite all of that, however, Matthew knew that they were in fact a lot safer than they had been for a while now.

“What?” Marie asks with a nervous smirk.

“Just thinking,” Matthew shrugs. Shaking his head, he gives in and says, “Let’s keep going. I guess we’ll find something eventually.”

“That’s sort of how exploring goes,” Marie laughs.

“Indeed,” Matthew slowly nods. He and Marie continue on ahead, finding further rooms at more or less even intervals.

“Where do you think the tunnel leads to?” Marie asks, “I was thinking it would go to the old Fulcrum hideout that you destroyed, but that’s clearly not the case now.”

Matthew takes a long, slow breath as he stares ahead into the dark void. Shrugging, he offers, “My guess is that it probably leads somewhere very secretive, otherwise someone would have found it by now. If not us or another Mudder, then one of the civilians.”

Looking around and peering into a larger alcove in the hallway, Marie says, “Speaking of the civilians, this place could make for a good place for a lot of them to live.”

“Provided we know it’s safe, yeah,” Matthew agrees.

“You want to know my theory about all this?” Marie asks.

“What’s that?”

“I think this is a smuggler route.”

“Yeah?”

“And I think they’re trading stuff literally under the radar through here.”

“New definition to criminal underground, huh?”

Marie chuckles, “Yeah. But, when you’ve got a government like the Coalition, everyone’s a criminal whether they try to be or not.”

“No better way to control everyone than keep them afraid… at least that’s what they want us to think.”

Marie doesn’t say anything, and the conversation ends there.

Another half-hour passes before Matthew hears the first signs of gassers. Their muted screeches and howls are something that he knew by heart now, and they send shivers down his spine. Involuntarily, Matthew’s grip on his rifle tightens and his finger slips toward the trigger. No matter what, he wasn’t about to let the gassers get the drop on him and Marie. He would do everything in his power to end the monsters’ lives before they were too close.

“They sound different than what I’m used to,” Marie whispers.

“That’s what they sound like when they’re not doing anything,” Matthew whispers back, “They’re just waiting around in there.”

“Still sounds all sorts of creepy.”

“It does,” Matthew agrees as a cold bead of sweat drips down his spine. As ready as he looked, Matthew knew he wasn’t mentally ready for what was next. Something about the gassers just rocked him to his core every time that he heard or saw them.

“Well, it’s your call if we keep going or not,” Marie breathes, “I personally think we need to clear the area, but there’s no shame in doubling back and getting help either. It sounds like there are a lot of them.”

Matthew’s heart skips a beat as he quickly thinks, As much as I’d like to do that, I can’t. I can’t force someone else to experience what I have, see what I’ve seen. The less everyone else knows about fighting the gassers the better.

A moment passes and Matthew shakes his head, “No. We’re doing this.”

“Copy that,” Marie nods, “What do you need me to do?”

“Cover my rear,” Matthew answers, “I’ll try and do all the shooting.”

“You know you don’t have to do everything…”

“This time I do,” Matthew shakes his head once more.

At that, Matthew begins marching ahead, drawing closer and closer to the howls of the gassers. As he does so, he can’t help but wish that he had night vision goggles or something along those lines, but it was far too late for that.

It was just him, his armor, his rifle, and his flashlight.

Nothing else mattered to Matthew in that moment.

Matthew slows his advance when he sees that the hallway opens up into a larger room up ahead. He can’t see much beyond where the room starts, but he can see that the hallway ends there.

“We wait here and let them come to us,” Matthew lets Marie in on his thoughts.

“Good plan,” Marie sounds.

Dropping to a kneeling position, Matthew keeps his rifle and flashlight trained on the entrance to the hallway from the large room beyond. Reaching back, Matthew pulls out a few of his harder-to-reach magazines and he lays them out on the floor beside him. Once that’s all finished, Matthew confirms that his grenades, sidearm, and knife are within easy reach as well and he looks back to Marie.

“You ready?” Marie asks.

Matthew nods and he turns his head back around.

A second passes and Matthew can’t help but wonder why the gassers hadn’t noticed the light from his flashlight. When another few seconds pass, Matthew can’t help but assume that the gassers are a lot stupider than he remembered.

Swallowing, he mentally prepares himself for a decision that he can’t help but think is monumentally stupider than the gassers themselves.

“Knock knock!” Matthew calls out, trying to get the attention of the potential herd of monsters in the dark room beyond.

The screeching, howling, and shrieking that follows makes Matthew grimace and he has to resist the urge to drop his rifle to cover his ears.

The amount of noise dips only marginally and, after a few seconds, Matthew hears the telltale sound of the gassers’ clumsy run as they make their way over to him through the dark room that they are in. There are several crashes during this time as well, and Matthew reasons that the gassers must be tripping over each other and some things in the room beyond due to the darkness.

Well, at least they can’t see in the dark, Matthew thinks to himself, That’s one mark in my favor. They’re just as blind as me.

Matthew’s finger flexes the moment that the first gasser tears around the corner and into the hallway.

With that flex, a single shot rings out and the gasser goes limp.

Carried on by its momentum, the gasser crashes into the wall opposite of where it had come, and it doesn’t move.

The next two gassers meet similar fates and Matthew realizes that the cries of the inhuman beasts are dying down substantially with each pull of his trigger.

Three more gassers charge, these emerge straight from the shadowy depths of the room beyond, and Matthew mows them down as well with a lot less care and fear than he had recalled feeling toward them earlier.

As the very one-sided fight continues, Matthew tries to reason where his fear had gone and what had changed. Part of him wanted to believe that he had become more of a battle-hardened soldier but, after thinking about it, Matthew realizes that the terrain of the fight had changed completely from his previous encounters with the gassers.

Up on the surface, in the trenches of the Bulwark, there were thousands of hiding places for all the gassers. They could emerge from over the top of the trenches, from sharp corners, from bunkers, and even from the mud.

Here, the gassers had only one place to go, and that was straight toward Matthew’s withering gunfire.

After no more than five minutes, Matthew puts a bullet in the head of the last gasser and the noise dies down after a few echoes.

Matthew and Marie were once again alone.

“Hold on,” Marie whispers before Matthew can move. A few seconds pass before Marie asks, “You don’t hear anything, right?”

“Right,” Matthew nods, unsure what he should be listening for at this point.

“That means that the other gassers must have left.”

“The ones that went to the east?”

“Yeah,”

“Wait, left where?”

“Left the tunnels. They would have heard all of the gassers and the shooting otherwise.”

“Which means that there’s an exit that way.”

“Right.”

“And that means the Beets can probably get in through there too…”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“Well, let’s keep our eyes peeled for any Beets then,” Matthew sighs. Frowning, he can’t help but remember just how dangerous Beets were. While the gassers stood as a very minor threat in the hallways, Beets were just about invulnerable by comparison. If there were any of them down here, Matthew knew that he would be in for a world of hurt.

“Well, no use waiting right here forever though,” Marie prods, “Let’s check out whatever’s ahead.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Matthew nods as he stows the unused magazines that he had laid out. As he does so, he can’t help but realize that he hadn’t even spent a whole magazine as he cleared out all the gassers. The fight truly was as easy as he had thought it was.

With his extra ammo stowed, Matthew pops out his near-empty magazine and replaces it with a full one. He didn’t want to get into a bind and end up running out of ammo after just a few shots. That done, Matthew carefully makes his way toward the large room ahead, his weapon raised and ready for anything.

The moment that Matthew’s feet cross over the threshold into the large room, he swings first to his right, then to his left, searching for any hostiles. Marie does the exact inverse and they both nod at one another when they are sure that the immediate area is clear.

“I think I saw a generator,” Matthew says as he looks back to his left, where he had seen the machine, “Think we should fire it up?”

Marie shrugs, “I don’t know, don’t you think it’s off for a reason?”

“Maybe, or maybe whoever it belongs to just turned it off because they weren’t sure when they’d be back.”

“What if it makes a bunch of noise and makes some other gassers attack?”

“Then we’ll deal with them,” Matthew answers simply as he walks over to the machine. Stopping in front of it, Matthew looks around one final time in search of hostiles. Seeing none, he turns his attention back to the machine. Sure enough, it’s a generator.

Definitely not big enough to power everything down here… Matthew thinks as he sizes up the unit. Shaking his head, he then flips a few switches and primes the engine. Pulling the ripcord on the dated unit, he is rewarded with a short sputter, a flash of the lights overhead, and then the engine dies.

“Must have been sitting idle for some time,” Marie notes.

“Yeah,” Matthew agrees as he shifts his footing. Grabbing the ripcord once more, he tugs. The second attempt is worse than the first, the third does marginally better, and the fourth finally sees the engine roar to life. Now running, the generator’s engine shifts into a low idle, and emergency lights flash to life in all directions, casting a low level of light everywhere and allowing Matthew to finally see without the aid of his flashlight.

“We’ll need to find some fuel for this thing,” Matthew says, “I’m not sure what it runs on, but we need to find more of it before it runs out. The fact the fuel lasted this long makes me think it must be hydrogen though.”

“Um… I’m not too sure that we’ll need to refuel it…” Marie says a sense of awe in her voice.

Turning, Matthew eyes Marie for a few beats before he follows her stare. She is looking at a large assortment of machines. A lot of the machinery is absolutely massive, but Matthew can’t make heads or tails of what he is looking at. His eyes eventually shift over to all the pipes leading in and around the various pieces of equipment and their haphazard paths do nothing to show the purpose of what Matthew is staring at. Some pipes lead into the ground, some into the machines, and some into what appear to be some kind of radiators. Sighing, Matthew eventually asks, “So, what is all of this?”

“It’s a geothermal plant,” Marie answers, her voice still filled with awe, “What could it be doing all the way out here and why?”

“My question is what is it supposed to power?” Matthew adds his own question to the mix. He had heard of geothermal power, but he had never seen it in use. Almost all the power he ever used was provided by some sort of generator that burns some sort of fuel back in Crail. The idea of free electricity like this was intriguing, to say the least, but Matthew knew enough to know that all of this was way outside of his area of expertise. He lets a few moments pass before he asks, “Can we power the Bulwark from this thing?”

“We should be able to tie in, yes.”

“Do you think that this thing’s supposed to power Thessalonia or some other big city around here?”

“I would have thought so, but the fact this place clearly hasn’t been used for so long makes me doubt that.”

“Then who do you think built this place?”

“I don’t know, but they must have wanted to keep it secret. People don’t go and build power stations underground for no reason.”

“Then…” Matthew trails off as he thinks. A minute or so passes before his eyes finally settle on three logos that are on the wall furthest from them.

One is of the Thessalonian Shipbuilding Company, another is a depiction of Allegra, and the final one is some sort of chevron.

“Matthew?” Marie prompts after a few seconds.

Still looking at the insignias, Matthew’s mind races. Where have I seen that last logo before? Why do I feel like I know what it means? Why… Matthew’s thoughts trail off and he points, “Marie, what’s that?”

Marie turns and looks, a second passes before she answers, “It’s the Resistance insignia.”

“And?”

“And… Well, I guess they must have had a part in building this place.”

“And they left their symbol here for anyone to find? Couldn’t that get the Thessalonian people in trouble? They clearly had a hand in all of this.”

Marie shakes her head slowly, “Matthew, I have absolutely no idea what’s going on here at this point… Honestly, I’m feeling a little scared because of all the questions I have now.”

“But the Resistance, aren’t they the good guys?”

“They are.”

“Then why would they come, build this place, and left?”

“I have absolutely no idea.”

“And why would the Thessalonian Shipbuilding Company build something like this? I thought they built ships! I thought—”

“Matthew,” Marie interrupts him with a laugh, “I’m serious, I’ve got absolutely no idea what’s going on now. Stop asking me questions I can’t answer.”

“Oh, sorry,” Matthew feels himself blushing slightly in response to his stupidity.

“Don’t be,” Marie smiles at him, “But I think it’s high time we got ourselves some answers.”

“But who would know the answers we need?”

“Well, ask yourself what Coalition soldiers from Allegra we might know that doesn’t like the Coalition.”

“That’s a lot of people.”

“Well, I’m talking about one particular group we know.”

“That’s still a lot of people,” Matthew chuckles nervously. For some reason, he isn’t able to properly rake his brain for the answer he needed thanks to how confused he is by the discovery around him.

“I’m talking about Vansen, Matthew,” Marie cuts straight to the chase, “If she doesn’t know about this, then I’m willing to bet that she at least knows someone who will know about this place.”

“Oh, right,” Matthew nods, “Well, I guess that means that we’ll have to explore everything later then? Because I think that’s sort of a pressing question now.”

“Your call,” Marie shrugs, “Depends on what you’d like to find out first, Mudskipper.” Marie offers Matthew a wink as she uses his unofficial title in the Bulwark.

Three

Vansen’s Camp, Allegra

“You know, Matthew, I’ve been thinking about something,” Marie says suddenly.

Happy for the distraction from the long wait that they had been suffering through in order to meet with Vansen, Matthew bites, “What’s that?”

“That power station might give us the oomph we need to really scale our war effort up.”

“And how would it do that?”

“We’d be able to make more fuel for our vehicles and mechs. Well, that’s provided we can get our hands on the machinery to create them.”

“Huh,” Matthew nods slowly, “Here I was just thinking about how nice it would be to consistently have the lights on…” Matthew trails off as he looks up at the sun in the sky. Tugging on the collar of his shirt, he can’t help but think about how hot things get in the Bulwark during the many long hours of daylight as well. It wasn’t nearly as hot up here in the mountains, which made visiting Vansen’s Camp much more appealing. Armed with electricity, Matthew hoped to get some air conditioning running to make things more pleasant for everyone down there as well.

Marie continues without skipping a beat, “There’s just so much we can do with the power… and that’s not even mentioning whatever else might be down there!”

“But we still don’t know if any of it works,” Matthew reminds Marie.

Matthew and Marie had poked around in the underground electricity plant looking for any obvious reasons why it wouldn’t work and came up empty-handed. On the surface, that was good news and meant that there was no reason why things wouldn’t work, but Matthew knew better than to assume as much. Technology and machinery always acted up after sitting idle too long—not even the Thessalonian Shipbuilders could overcome that fact. Matthew knew he got lucky with the old seeder ship, these new generators, he was sure, would be a different matter.

“Well, if things don’t work down there, then I’m sure we’ll be able to figure it out,” Marie counters, “We’ve got enough smart people in and around the Bulwark that I’m sure we’d work through it. If we’re lucky, then maybe some of the people who built it might still be around too!”

“Huh, I hadn’t considered that,” Matthew nods. In all likelihood, there probably were still some people in the Bulwark from the Thessalonian Shipbuilding Company who knew about the geothermal plant.

Why they didn’t mention as much, Matthew didn’t know, but that was an issue for another day.

Regardless of whatever the others’ reasons were for not being more forthcoming with information, Matthew still would have had to find Vansen. For some reason, she seemed to have an in with everyone on Allegra—one that seemed deeper than her simply being from the same planet as them.

Thus, Matthew and Marie are here, atop some mountain, waiting for Vansen to finish up whatever her latest project was.

“This place seems to have come a long way from when I was here last,” Marie says, clearly trying to strike up a conversation to pass the time.

“Yeah,” Matthew agrees as he scans over all the newer buildings. Several of the new places were just foundations or staked out sections of land the last time he was here. Now, just a couple of days later, Vansen’s Camp is looking even more like a small village.

Except for the presence of all the heavy weapons and soldiers, Matthew corrects his initial impression, Maybe it’s more of a military base than anything.

As that thought passes through Matthew’s head, he notices a few soldiers moving a large cannon into one of the larger buildings that overlook the approach to the mountainside base. Where the weapon was from, Matthew didn’t know. He pauses a moment as the thought strikes him as odd, here they were, moving big pieces of artillery and Matthew couldn’t find the will to care. Ever since the Dawns had arrived, everything seemed so much easier and materials so much more available. The idea of Vansen claiming weapons for herself out of the growing cache wasn’t alarming and that was weird to Matthew.

Well, maybe everything James told me was just a big old lie, Matthew finds himself thinking, Maybe they had all the weapons, ammo, supplies, and a whole lot more this whole time. Maybe the Fulcrum was just stealing all of it and hiding whatever was left.

Matthew already knew that the Fulcrum had been stealing and hoarding everything for some time now. Ever since his showdown and his clearing out of their bunker, Matthew had known that.

However, the idea that there might be other hidden caches of things was a new one. Suddenly Matthew realized that there might be a reason why so many things were beginning to show up—the civilians who had been at the rear of the Bulwark all this time must be recovering everything that they had seen James and the rest of the Fulcrum hide over their tenure on the front.

“Marie?” Matthew eventually asks.

Marie turns from all the commotion around them and smiles, “Yes?”

Frowning slightly, Matthew decides to pass along his theory to Marie, “Do you think that all the stuff that we’ve been getting added to our supplies was hidden by the Fulcrum?”

“I’m sure of it,” Marie nods, “They were a slimy bunch of people and they mentioned hidden stashes a few times while they had me locked up.”

“And you didn’t think to tell me that?”

Marie shrugs, “I hadn’t thought of it since then…” Marie trails off and stares into the distance, “I don’t like thinking about them and what they did.”

“Oh,” Matthew says in a hollow voice. He hadn’t even considered how Marie’s time as their prisoner—no, their slave—could have adversely impacted her.

“I don’t know where the stashes were, or how many there were, but I guess we can assume they were all in the rear. I couldn’t see them striking out into no man’s land ever, not even to hide anything.”

“Which means that the civilians and everyone else would have seen it happening.”

“At least some of it, yes. I guess that’s where so much stuff is coming from. That, and their personal stashes.”

Matthew nods along slowly, happy that his train of thought was now verified by Marie, “I thought so…”

“Sorry for the wait, sir,” Vansen’s voice booms from behind Matthew.

Matthew spins around and sees Vansen marching straight toward him with several people in tow. One is Fahy, the other Boris, and the remainder are some other soldiers that Matthew had already seen around the camp during his other visits.

“No worries, we were able to keep busy,” Marie says with a warm smile.

“As you can see, I’ve been keeping busy as well,” Vansen returns, “There’s been a whole lot to do.”

“I’ll admit that I’m impressed,” Matthew nods approvingly as he looks around once more, “This place is really bustling now.”

“I’ve been stealing away some of your civilians that I know I can trust,” Vansen continues, “Hence the population boom and some of the new buildings.”

“Sounds smart, get them out of the line of fire.”

“And put them to work,” Vansen adds, “Their efforts have been indispensable.”

“That’s good to hear, I’ll be sure to steal them back sometime so they can help me too,” Matthew says with a soft chuckle.

“Well, they’re still yours, sir,” Vansen chuckles as well. Her demeanor shifts back to her usual, formal one and she asks, “Now what have you come all the way up here for, sir?”

“Something we’d like to talk to you and your core team privately about,” Matthew answers, “We’ve found something very, very interesting.”

“A time machine that’ll let us forget all about this awful place?” Vansen asks with a laugh. Not waiting for a response, she turns to her small entourage and dismisses them. As they disperse, she continues to Matthew, “We can meet in my little fort over there.”

Matthew follows where Vansen is pointing, and he sees that she is looking at the building where the large cannon had disappeared into. His heart skips a beat as the thought of exploring the structure excites him. He had been eying it since they had arrived and was very curious about what it was for and what it looked like inside. Now he would find out.

“Big place,” Marie nods.

Vansen is quick to reply to that, “Just getting ready for whatever’s next. As you can see, I’ve got a good view of the Bulwark. If anything was to happen, this place will be invaluable.”

Matthew nods but doesn’t say anything. He can sense that Marie isn’t too fond of the idea of having cannons like the ones Vansen had trained on her home at all hours. Admittedly, Matthew had to agree. However, he knew that Vansen’s reasoning was solid as well.

Rather than let the silence continue, Vansen adds, “We’re talking about building a few similar forts elsewhere, just in case the Coalition comes for us, or the Beets make another run.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Matthew nods once more, unsure what else he can say or do at the moment. He hadn’t come to discuss defenses, that was a matter for another time. Right now, all he cared about was figuring out what was built beneath the Bulwark.

Matthew and the others follow Vansen into the fort without another word. When they’re still a few meters away, the large wooden doors swing open, revealing the solid metal backing that they are built on.

Peering through the open doorway, Matthew can see that the inside of the fort is anything but complete. There are sawhorses, piles of materials, countless tools, and a lot more clutter all around. Overhead, light is streaming in through a roof Matthew just now realizes is incomplete. A few scattered sections of the fort appear to be complete and have stone walls, but those rooms are in the severe minority.

“It’s not much just yet, but I’m hoping it’ll rival the bunkers you all have down there,” Vansen smiles, “We’ve been working very hard on this thing.”

“It’s a lot nicer than most of our bunkers,” Matthew admits. Nodding slowly as he looks around, he adds, “I think I’ll have to ask you to build us a few bunkers down there when you’re all finished here.”

“Oh? Sorry, I just assumed…” Vansen trails off and she looks away for a moment before she says, “Of course, we’ll get things squared away here, and then I’ll send down everyone and everything that I can.”

“Think you all could help build some houses for everyone too?” Matthew decides to press his luck.

“Of course, of course,” Vansen says, nodding quickly, “I’m sorry, I got so caught up in all of this. It’s just—”

“No need to apologize,” Matthew interrupts, “I’ve been too busy to pay as much attention to things as I should have as well.”

“Thank you, sir,” Vansen offers a quick, strained smile. Turning away, she briskly crosses through the construction projects in the fort and then stops outside the door to one of the rooms. Opening it, she herds Matthew and the others in. Closing the door behind everyone, Vansen starts, “So, what is it, sir? Is this about you and—uh—Her Highness? …Is this about you two getting together?

“What?” Matthew hears himself say, his shock preventing anything else from processing in his head.

“We all know,” Vansen chuckles as a smirk crosses over her face. With a shake of her head, she slips back into her businesslike tone and says, “Judging by your reaction, that’s not what this is about. What is it, sir?”

Matthew is quick to take the out and avoid Vansen’s original question and comment. Nodding once, he fills Vansen in on what he and Marie had explored and finishes by asking her a slew of questions.

“Well, I can confidently say that I have absolutely zero idea what any of that is,” Vansen admits, using far more words than usual to answer. Looking at Fahy and Boris, she asks, “Do either of you know anything about this?”

“No, ma’am,” both men answer with shakes of their heads.

Frowning, Vansen slowly paces the room. Sighing, she shakes her head and says, “I know for a fact that my brother would have mentioned this to me if he knew about it, so I’m guessing the Allegrian militia, or at least the newer member they have, don’t know either…”

“Allegrian militia?” Matthew queries.

“What?” Vansen asks, snapping out of her thoughts. Nodding slowly, she proceeds to answer, “I thought you knew about them, sorry. The Allegrians have a militia. I know a lot of people who are in it…” Vansen trails off as she looks at Fahy and Boris, “I guess we’re all in it, technically. Or we’re fighting the same people, at least. They’re hoping to catch the attention of the Resistance—”

“Oh!” Matthew remembers something that he had left out of his debrief, “The Resistance insignia is down in the power plant too. Them and the Thessalonian Shipbuilding Company.”

“Now that’s an interesting turn of events,” Vansen frowns.

“Why don’t you tell them?” Fahy asks Vansen.

Vansen cocks her head, “Tell them what?”

Fahy leans in and whispers something into Vansen’s ear.

A spark of realization flashes in Vansen’s eyes and she breathes, “Oh.” Vansen turns to Fahy and asks, “But are you sure they’re still alive?”

Fahy shrugs, “I don’t see why not, they had all the weapons they needed.”

“I guess that’s true,” Vansen nods. Turning back to Matthew, she says, “I know a guy who might have the answers we need. We can either ask around here, or we can go to him. If anyone would know, he’d know.”

“Well, let’s go to him then,” Matthew impulsively answers, “Who is he?”

“He’s the old general in charge of Allegra’s entire military… There’s a small caveat about him though…”

Fahy fills Matthew in on Vansen’s behalf, “We don’t know if he’s alive, and he’s a long way away from here.”

Matthew frowns, “How far?”

“Far enough that I wouldn’t go out there without one of your mechs,” Vansen answers, “Probably more than just one of them too. It’s deep behind enemy lines.”

“That’s a lot of fuel…” Matthew’s frown deepens.

“Remember we’ll have all the fuel we need when the geothermal plant is back online,” Marie reminds Matthew, “On top of that, there’s going to be plenty more of everything we need when the bulk of the supplies and equipment we requested arrives.”

“We don’t know when that’ll get here though,” Matthew grunts, “It’s already been…” Matthew trails off when he realizes that he had no idea how much time had passed since his superiors had promised him everything, “How long has it been?”

“Since your call with Johnson and Nelson?” Marie asks.

Matthew nods.

“About four days now,” Marie answers, “And that’s Allegrian days.”

“And how many Earth Standard days is that?” Matthew asks rather pointedly.

“Well, that was on August fifth…” Marie pauses and Matthew watches as she mentally runs the numbers in her head, “That’s been a whole week now.”

Nodding once, Matthew reveals his pessimistic view of things, “Which leads me to believe that it’s either not coming, or they aren’t prioritizing it at all.”

“Or maybe it’s just taking longer than expected,” Marie argues quietly.

Matthew lets Marie’s comment slide, largely because he hoped that it was true. He hoped that the supplies and everything else would be coming soon. Smaller shipments of food, ammo, and other things had been arriving by truck ever since Johnson’s pledge, the only things that had yet to surface were the larger requests, such as all the equipment and the return of the Toaz to the Bulwark.

“You’ve got to decide how important finding out about the power station is to you,” Vansen says with a halfhearted shrug, “I’d recommend finding out sooner rather than later. Odds are the general would know who to contact to get it running again too.”

“So, our hands are tied and we have to go then?” Matthew asks, part of him hoping that Vansen would affirm as much and force his hand. The idea of sending people deep into no man’s land over something like this seemed careless and wasteful and Matthew wanted a strong second opinion before he tried anything like it.

“No one’s forcing you to do anything, sir,” Vansen shakes her head.

Matthew frowns, saddened by Vansen’s watered-down answer. It was clear that she was leaving Matthew to decide this one on his own.

“What will it be, Matthew?” Marie quietly asks after a few seconds.

Still frowning, Matthew answers, “We’ll head out for the general. I’ll need you and your team though, Vansen. We need someone he’ll recognize; he will recognize you, right?”

“He will,” Vansen nods.

Matthew takes a long breath and he lets it out slowly. Well, this is it then, he thinks as a few dozen doubts race through his head. There aren’t nearly as many doubts racing around as there would have been just a few weeks ago, which Matthew finds odd, but he also finds it reassuring. He knew what he was doing and he knew that his people did as well.

“When do we leave, Mudskipper?” Vansen asks, “I need twenty minutes to arrange a few things, but will be available after that.”

“Then we’ll leave in an hour or so,” Matthew says with a confident nod, “I’ll radio down to the twins and tell them to get everything ready.”

Marie lightly touches Matthew’s arm and she says, “Be sure to tell them to tell the others that we’re leaving too. We’ll need our bunker mates to keep an eye on things while we’re gone.”

“Will do,” Matthew nods. A few seconds pass before Matthew realizes something he had overlooked, “Wait, we have too many people for how many mechs we have.”

Vansen is quick to speak up, “My team and I could use your small ones and you, Marie—I mean Her Highness—sorry, and the twins could man the big one.”

“Sounds like you were ready for that one,” Matthew says with a semi-awkward chuckle.

Vansen shrugs before she also chuckles, “I’ve been wanting to take a mech for a spin for a long time now, this was my chance.”

Smiling, Matthew nods, “Well, I like it. I’ll meet you at Sanctuary when you’re ready. Marie and I will help get things set up.”

“And there’s no need to call me Her Highness or anything else like that,” Marie adds, “Just Marie works great. It’s been enough for me all these years, nothing is about to change that.”

“Copy that,” Vansen bows her head slightly to Marie before she turns to her team. After barking a few short orders, Vansen and her team leave the room.

“Matthew?” Marie asks once they’re alone.

Matthew can’t help but feel a little worried as he asks, “Yes? What is it?”

“Have I changed?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, everyone is trying to give me all these royal titles now. I haven’t changed. Besides, why don’t people call Rav’ian these things?”

Matthew shrugs and shakes his head, “I don’t know Marie. I don’t think you’ve changed, not much, at least, but maybe I’m missing the same things you are.”

Marie doesn’t say anything else, and Matthew can’t think of anything to say to her. Everyone’s reactions to Marie had been changing, and Matthew didn’t know why. Part of him suspected that the Dawn soldiers had something to do with it, but that was just speculation. He lacked any sort of factual basis other than the few times that Hamilton had tried correcting him and the others.

Sighing, Matthew gives up on trying to think of reasons why people were acting differently and he pulls out his radio. After checking a few things with Marie, he radios down to the twins and he passes along everything that he knew and everything he needed them to do.

“We’ll get right to it, Mudskipper,” Louise assures him, “We’ll be all set by the time you get here.”

“Be sure to bring a lot of ammo too,” Matthew adds, knowing that such a request was likely obvious. Despite that, he felt the urge to say it.

“Already done,” Louise’s voice chirps. A moment passes before she hesitantly asks, “Think we should bring—I don’t know—some sort of gift? Something to get on the guy’s good side?”

Matthew pauses as he considers it. Bringing a gift in order to garner goodwill could be helpful, however, Matthew isn’t sure quite what he had on hand that he could spare, “What did you have in mind?”

“I don’t know…” Louise trails off, “I was thinking a vehicle, now that we have a few, but it’d be impossible to drive it out there. Maybe something else. Ammo maybe? One of our new cannons?”

“Maybe some fuel?” Matthew offers as he thinks about just how tight of a commodity fuel was in their current environment, “I mean, if we’re hurting for it, then I’m sure they are too.”

“We’d need to find something to transport it in that would be secure,” Louise warns.

“Have Alois weld us an armored box for it,” Matthew instructs, “We’ll put a tank inside and strap it to the Firefly.”

Louise laughs, “Well, that might just be crazy enough to work. I’m on it, Mudskipper.”

“Thanks, Louise,” Matthew says with a smile before he puts his radio away. Looking at Marie, he nods, “Ready?”

“Well, considering that we’re probably the first people to try getting this far behind enemy lines, probably not,” Marie quips. She nods for a moment of thought before she adds, “I’d bet people haven’t even flown in that deep yet either, so doing it on foot will make it even scarier.”

“Firefly will get us in and out in one piece,” Matthew assures her, “It hasn’t let us down yet.”

“Mudskipper?” Louise sounds over the radio, “I’m getting some readings from the new sensors someone put up…”

Matthew freezes in place as memories of the Beet’s charge flash through his head. He wasn’t ready for something like that, not again. Besides that, the Dawns had already expended most of their anti-Beet defenses, which meant that they were going to be on their own this time. Swallowing, Matthew rips his radio from its place and he raises it to his mouth. Clearing his throat, he tries to think of something, anything, that he might be able to say.

“It’s looking like ships,” Louise continues, “Several of them. They’re coming from the west. Jane’s tried hailing them, still waiting on a response. We’ve tried reaching out to our radioman too, but you know how long he takes to reply sometimes.”

Matthew’s shock and fear dissipate, but he still feels thoroughly stressed. What do they want? Who are they? Is it Johnson with everything he promised? He sure took his time… Maybe it’s someone else, maybe the civilians found some ships. Maybe… Matthew’s mind races with a million questions and only a dozen or so possibilities. He is at a complete loss as to what is going on right now.

“Third Sergeant Campbell, it’s been a while,” Captain Johnson’s friendly voice comes in over Matthew’s radio. Before Matthew can question anything, Johnson explains himself, “Your radioman patched me through to your handheld piece. He’s good, you should keep him around.”

“Yes, sir,” Matthew nods, unsure what else he can do or say.

“I’ve got quite the surprise for you, Campbell,” Captain Johnson continues, “Quite a few surprises, actually. You wouldn’t believe how many strings I had to pull… I’ll save you the details, I know you’re a busy man on the front. Innovating and fighting the Beets in ways no other Mudder ever has, General Nelson is very pleased.”

“That’s good to hear, sir,” Matthew sounds, hoping that he is showing the captain that he is listening intently.

Johnson continues like he hadn’t heard Matthew, “I’m flying in from the west with a few… a few friends. We’ll be landing within the hour. You’ll want to be there.”

“I will be,” Matthew pledges. Not waiting for Johnson to respond to that, Matthew looks over at Marie, his eyes wide, and he breathes, “Well, we’re going to have to run as fast as we can, otherwise we’re going to be late!”

“I told you they were still coming!” Marie exclaims happily, “I bet the Toaz are with him too!”

DESPERATE PLEA!

Thank you for exploring the future alongside me!

I’d love to hear what you think about my book!

Please drop an honest review of what you thought about it on Amazon or Goodreads!

Thank you so much!

Caleb Fast

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The Story Continues,

The Black Forest has beasts within its borders, as the stories warned. It also has potentially untold riches.

Will Matthew and his teams find it?

Read on the see what happens in the war for Allegra!

The Battle for Allegra Episode Twenty:

Available 2022

In the meantime, check out my series of full-length novels! The Coalition will face its greatest test yet!

Renaissance: The Limit of Infinity

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07QXKFDV9

Other Books By Caleb Fast:

The Battle for Allegra Series:

Season One:

Conscripted (1)

First Kill (2)

The Hunt (3)

Relegated (4)

Retrieval (5)

Sanctuary (6)

Secured (7)

Harborage (8)

Revelations (9)

Promotion (10)

Season Two:

Awakening (11)

Arrival (12)

Dawn (13)

Fortify (14)

Black Forest (15)

Seeder (16)

Warpath (17)

Fireworks (18)

Underground (19)

The Limit of Infinity Series:

Renaissance: The Limit of Infinity

Escapade: A Price to Be Paid

Overcomer: No Man Left Behind

Wayward: Long Way from Home